REVIEW: The Impact Soundworks Orchestral Bundle

by Steven McDonald

ISW Orchestral Bundle, while not a complete orchestral library set, offers a few unique tools that can help round out any other orchestral collection. Vocalisa and Rhapsody Orchestral Percussion alone make this bundle definitely worth picking up.

The ISW Orchestral Bundle, while not a complete orchestral library set, offers a few unique tools that can help round out any other orchestral collection. Vocalisa and Rhapsody Orchestral Percussion alone make this bundle definitely worth picking up, while Furia, Orchestral Colors, and Bravura Chords & FX fill in some niche gaps that might exist in your current selections.

Thoughts

Bravura Scoring Brass Chords and FX

See all Rhapsody Orchestral Colors facts, Demos and official videos here:

Bravura Scoring Brass Chords and FX is a small taste of what is available in the full BSB Package. This particular bundle only includes this minor part of the Bravura range. This brass has a fairly small and “not epic” sound. It works well in the soft and warm ranges. The two playable ensemble patch types are the “Chords” and “Orchestrator” patches, which honestly are a bit disappointing. These both use smart scripting to automatically voice chords and clusters with different instruments, which results in often unnatural sounding playing. Sometimes notes wouldn’t even sound when trying to play a single pitch. Overall, playing with a regular ensemble patch is easier and produces better results. These really aren’t that useful for actually producing music unless you’re looking for a really rough sketching tool. A few basic articulations are available, as well as 3 mic positions, offering some flexibility.

However, this product does feature a more complete “FX” section than any other brass I’ve encountered. With all kinds of rips, falls, clusters, textures, and other oddities recorded on all of the instruments, this could be a useful grab for someone working on a horror or melodramatic comedy project.

Rhapsody Orchestral Colors

See all Rhapsody Orchestral Colors facts, Demos and official videos here:

Rhapsody Orchestral Colors presents a (mostly) complete orchestra and choir in an ensemble format. While this is a complete product, it is mostly designed as another quick sketching tool. Technically all of the instruments were recorded, and most of them are available as split patches (however they seem to be bugged and take far longer to load than the ensembles), although there are some shortcuts taken. For example, Violins and Violas are recorded together, and high woodwinds are all grouped as well. The interface allows you to solo each section if you want, though the instruments all seem to have shortened ranges as well. ROC is definitely at its strongest when playing in full ensemble patch mode.The sound is nice – it’s definitely a smaller orchestra and designed for more intimate styles. It’s also worth noting that, as with most ensemble patches, there are noticeable “seams” where the range of one instrument ends and another begins. This can create awkward timbre changes in some melodies or patterns. Overall though, ROC provides the “meat” of this orchestral bundle.

Furia Staccato Strings

See all Furia Staccato Strings facts, Demos and official videos here:

Furia is a lean and mean library with a clear focus. Very lightweight and surprisingly flexible in sound, it gives us a nice and full string ensemble with which to play staccato. The interface allows you to adjust things like ensemble timing, the amount of voices, and 2 mic positions. These controls let you dial in the size and bite of the ensemble. These strings sound much more “fluffy” and less close than those in Orchestral Colors, so they don’t feel like a rehash of anything. This library could be very useful for those writing library music or other styles where detailed orchestration isn’t the focus. Furia is a very solid staccato string library that will definitely get some use.

Rhapsody Orchestral Percussion

See all Rhapsody Orchestral Percussion facts, Demos and official videos here:

Rhapsody Orchestral Percussion is the most complete and detailed product in this bundle. It has been well regarded for a long time as a great library for natural sounding orchestral percussion, and I’m happy to report that this is true. This isn’t a library for “epic” trailer percussion or anything overly bombastic, but if you’re looking for a great source of cymbals, mallets, timpani and other traditional percussion, this is a perfect solution. Everything has 3 mic positions and usually left and right hand strokes sampled. For drums and cymbals, rolls are mapped to the black keys and are controllable with the mod wheel. This is a great library with a ton of instruments sampled, and my personal top performer in this bundle.

Vocalisa Choir

See all Vocalisa Choir facts, Demos and official videos here:

In a very close second place comes Vocalisa Choir, and it’s only second place because it is more of a niche product without as many uses as Rhapsody Percussion, but for that specific Bulgarian choir sound, Vocalisa is a fantastic choice. The phrase builder allows you to assign syllables to a grid or choose via keyswitch. Each syllable can be tweaked if something sticks out to you. There is only one mic position, but it isn’t overly wet and it’s fairly flexible. The master patch has a slightly reduced range and less syllables than the individual soprano/alto/mezzo patches. There are also staccatos in the individual patches. Clusters and other FX, including breaths, stomps, and claps, are available as well. Don’t be surprised if you find yourself looking for excuses to use a Bulgarian women’s’ choir in your next project after buying this.

For a limited time, you can save 83% OFF The Impact Soundworks Orchestral Bundle. Buy it for $79 at VSTBuzz.

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